Street Repair Plan Springs From 'Fix Our Streets' Movement

Hundreds of people attended a meeting in Lakeview last night to find a way to repair the city’s crumbling streets. The discussion drew residents from neighborhoods across the city.

Ann LeBlanc is president of the Lakeview Civic Improvement Association. The meeting prompted by a grassroots movement called “Fix Our Streets” offered the city a blueprint for finding a solution.

“We want to form a citizens group to survey and identify the problem," she said. "We want to then kind of put the information from the committees and the surveys and report back to the citizens and have continuing town hall meetings so there’s transparency, there’s accountability, there’s sustainability.”

LeBlanc says broken streets have been a problem in New Orleans for years.

“I’ve lived here since 1991 and I will say it’s always been bad," she said. "But I believe it got worse after Katrina. The best was I described in my newsletter to Lakeview Civic, basically, you’ve got to get your car fixed about twice a year.”

City Council President Stacy Head repeated her call at the meeting to tax thousands of properties now considered exempt because they’re owned by charities and religious organizations.